The report by MPs on the lack of consultants in emergency units has intensified the debate about the pressures NHS services are struggling to cope with. In recent weeks different parts of our health service have seemingly been taking turns to report the difficulties they are facing. One important strand, which is linked to the reported problems in emergency services, has focused on general practice. Sadly, this has all too often descended into a blame game where GPs are held solely responsible for the problems in emergency care or out-of-hours services. Not only has this not helped move us forward to real solutions, it also doesn't match the realities that healthcare staff are struggling to cope with every day.

I have been a GP in Hertfordshire for two years, working at a practice full time and – like four out of 10 of my colleagues – in out- of-hours care. During my career I have seen a drastic increase in the level of pressure on all the services I am involved in.

Patient demand has steadily risen, in many cases from an increasingly ageing population. It is to be celebrated that modern medicine is helping us live longer, but a side effect is that we can develop conditions that require expensive care. My appointments with older patients are frequently longer due to multiple, complicated health needs that require careful care and attention. This inevitably eats into the time I have for appointments with other patients.

I'm seeing the same in my out-of-hours shifts where demand has risen drastically. It is not just older patients who are increasingly calling for help. Many younger patients, understandably unwilling or unable to get time off work, are opting for a quick fix to call out-of-hours, only increasing the pressure on these services. There is no doubt the NHS needs to adapt to face this cultural shift to a 24-hour society, but at the moment resources and planning have not caught up.

Out-of-hours funding, for example, has remained stagnant for years, and resources have not been diverted to help recruit extra doctors, set up call lines or other infrastructure to handle patient demand. Walk-in centres have seen a rise in use, but there is conflicting evidence as to whether these have taken pressure off existing services or resulted in a large amount of "induced demand" where, because they are easily accessible, patients pop in with minor conditions that would clear up without help from a doctor.

Both my personal experience and that of other GPs suggest healthcare staff are working harder to cope with this pressure. General practice is getting through a million consultations a day, with the new GP contract resulting in a rise of 50 million consultations in the five years after its introduction in 2004. A large number of GPs are playing the lead role in managing the 18 million patients with chronic conditions. As the British Medical Association's conference recently heard, work-related stress and burnout among doctors is rising.

Unfortunately, while workload is going up, resources are shrinking. The Nicholson challenge means the NHS has to find £20bn in efficiency savings by 2015. Now we're hearing that an extra £30bn will have to be found by 2020. This is coming as changes to the GP contract, rightly fought by the BMA, will see average practice funding cut, and new ways of tying GPs in red tape introduced. Emergency care departments face staff shortages, and out-of-hours care, starved of resources for decades, is facing a future with no extra money.

The solution is not simply to throw more money at the NHS. Doctors accept that we will have to cope with financial constraints, but instead of working with healthcare professionals to tackle these problems, politicians have dished out blame or offered simplistic solutions launched with a flurry of publicity. One government suggestion is for GPs to "take back out-of-hours care". That comes as a surprise to me, as I already work in out-of-hours care.

What we need is to clear this fog of confusion. We need a sensible, honest debate where professionals and patients are asked to work collaboratively with the government to come up with solutions that work. I believe that we must look to reduce the emphasis on competition that is needlessly chewing up time and resources in the NHS. We also need to spend more time ensuring that there is better integration of services across the NHS, and that we truly address the shift to a 24-hour society. This will have huge cost and structural implications that will require politicians to be clearer to the public about what can be achieved.

It is going to be a long, hard process, but as someone who works on the frontline we need to take the politics out of the NHS and find real, practical solutions now.